


Fall So Easy

by resolute



Category: X-Men (Comicverse), X-Men (Movies)
Genre: F/F, F/M, canon mashup, it's noncon if you are lying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-12
Updated: 2007-03-12
Packaged: 2018-05-10 02:21:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5565505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/resolute/pseuds/resolute
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jean is in graduate school. Graduate school is hard for many reasons, not the least of which is the loneliness.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fall So Easy

It's funny, but his glasses don't get in my way.  
  
Jean's pants are still up and I don't want to break this moment by undressing her. Seduction has a rhythm, a time, and if I stop to make her think -- even for a second -- this will fall apart. I open my mouth and spread her legs and press my face against the crotch of her sweatpants and exhale, hard. Hot air across her and I can smell it now, sex and desire. She lets go of my hair and falls back, catching herself on her palms on the counter. There goes the other wineglass. I hear it break on the far side of the counter.  
  
I press my mouth and nose against her now, wet tongue against the cotton jersey fabric. Rougher than I think she might be used to, but through the cloth it works. She's panting and making noises that aren't words. Noises that aren't "stop," or "Scott," or "don't."  
  
_After this I'll show her the money. All the money in the bag. And she won't ask too closely where it came from or who died for it. And we'll go find this Erik she knows. And this will be the end of it, of drug deals and prostitution and bloody little muggings in shithole apartments. This woman with her power and her loneliness and her complete fucking obliviousness.  
  
A little sex and they fall so fucking easy._  
  
****  
  
"You have no idea, Jean," Misty says. I switch the phone to my other ear. "These classes are crazy," she continues, "I mean, I thought Intro to Ethics? Would be easy, right? 'Cause I know right and wrong, right? But this prof, she is making me think. I don't have _time_ to think!"  
  
"Mm-hmm?" Misty tells me about her new life. About her cases as social worker. About classes. About the paperwork and hoops she has to go through in her campaign to become 'Officer Knight of the NYPD .' I sympathize, but, I just don't have much to say. When we were roommates in college, we had a lot more in common. Similar schedules, if not the same classes. Finals together. I had Scott, Misty had a few different guys here and there. We had a life that was a bond. Shared between friends. When she says she has to go, I assure her that it will all be fine, that she will do great, and hang up.  
  
  
I look around my apartment. It's a room and a half, and I couldn't afford even that much without the professor's money. I could live somewhere else, I suppose, with a new roommate. Someone else from the Sackler Institute, maybe? Or the med school.  
  
Scott looks at me from the shelf above the desk. In the photo he's sitting on his bike, his hair all mussed from the helmet, that perfect goofy grin on his face. The picture is from this spring, the trees in the photo behind him are wet with recent rain. I can see, where his jacket is unzipped, the shirt I gave him last Christmas. The gorgeous blue one. He'd worn it on New Year's Eve. Much later that night I'd taken the shirt off of him as slowly as I could stand it. Torturing myself, and him, together. His breath had been warm in my hair while I leaned over the small buttons. I had given up at the end, tearing the last two buttons away. "And you wouldn't let me sew them back on," I whisper to him. "Wanted to do it yourself, and they're crooked now, and you always grin at me when you wear that shirt."  
  
I call him. His number at the mansion. He doesn't answer and I will _not_ cry until _after_ I leave a message. He has enough to think about, with opening up the school to more students, and getting state-certified, and recruiting with the professor. I will not be one more thing he has to take care of or fix. _You are never responsible for me,_ I silently tell his picture. I clear my throat before leaving a message. "It's me. Just . . . looking at this picture of you and looking forward to being with you during the winter holidays. You could wear that shirt again, and see if we can tear off a few more buttons. Maybe an homage to last New Year's? I love you, Scott. Take care."  
  
After I hang up, Scott's picture watches me. Is that a question in his eyes? A glare on his face? "I meant to tell Misty about you," I tell him. "About how busy you are." They were all busy, that was the problem. _Except Scott is busy with people he knows, and Misty is busy doing what she loves, and Hank is busy breaking Yale's academic system, And Ororo is at Berkeley. And dating that guy, that guy who's name sounds like a sneeze? Oh, god, way to be ethnically sensitive, Jean. Thank god you're the telepath and not 'Ro. What is his name again?_ I glare at Scott. He's no help. _Atcholl, Watchina, Chewie, no, . . . T'Challa! That's right, T'Challa!_  
  
_Feeling sorry for myself didn't get the work done yesterday. And it won't tonight, either._ I haul out the textbook for tomorrow's class.  Introduction to Cellular Neuroscience, by Dr. Stewart Bloomfield. _Who, incidentally, is the instructor._ Scott's frowning at me now, I can tell. I scowl at his picture.  
  
"Stop that. I still don't know how I did on the midterm. I could have gotten a B. You never know." He's probably squinting at me. It's hard to tell with his glasses on. And, of course, I'm talking to a picture. "I don't mean to cheat, but he sits in the classroom! He's right there, Scott, and he wrote the text. He knows all of this backwards and forwards. And he thought about it during the exam!" Now Scott doesn't believe me, I just know it. "You don't _know_ whether I got an A. And how do you know, even if I did, how do you know I wasn't studying really hard?" I knock the picture over with my telekinesis. A frivolous use of power and an unseemly display of temper, Charles would say. "If you'd answered the phone, Scott, I might actually be talking to you about this. Instead of arguing with your picture about whether I'm a liar and a cheat, and sitting in my apartment going crazy. What do you think?" I lift the edge of the picture of and check his face. He's smiling at me. He's always smiling at me. That beautiful smile.  
  
_'I have confidence in you,' is what you'd say._  
  
I drop his picture. Confidence in me. The text book sits in front of me accusingly. I hope I didn't cheat on the midterm. I don't know half the time. I wish I could talk to Mr. Lehnsherr.  
  
_\----  
  
"Jean." His voice was rich and resonant and whole, and Jean leaned against her kitchen wall in relief. "You shouldn't have called," he said gently.  
  
"I know, Mr. Lehnsherr, but I saw the news."  
  
"Yes. Their so-called news, with the ever present fifth column from within, and shifting vague threats from without. You should know better than to concern yourself with my safety. I shan't take unnecessary risks."  
  
"I know," Jean said again. "But mistakes happen. I just wanted to make sure you are alright."  
  
"Does Charles know that his prize pupil still calls me? A wanted felon?"  
  
"Mr. Lehnsherr," Jean said. Her tone was quelling, but she trusted he could hear her smile. He always called her that, a prize, like she was a trophy the professor had picked up at the state fair. "I don't know if he knows or not."  
  
"I hear you saying that you haven't told, him, then."  
  
"It's not . . . I can call my friends."  
  
"And we are, Jean, always to be friends."  
  
"I know," Jean says. "I still wish you'd stop and come back to the school."  
  
"I can't stop now, Jean. You know this. I am a wanted criminal. I would be forced to stand trial for that nonsense in Nevada. And I will not be caged by humans again."  
  
Jean frowned. "You're still human, Erik."  
  
"Are we?"  
  
"Of course."  
  
"I see." He paused. "You should not call this number again, Jean," he said gently. "It isn't safe, for you. I shall send you a message with a safe number for emergencies. Forget you ever knew this one."  
  
"Erik . . ."  
  
"Goodbye for now, Jean. I wish you only the best. May you grow into all that you are."  
  
"Erik!" Jean said, but the line was already silent.  
  
\----_  
  
I'm sniffling now. This, this is awful. This is stupid. I'm going to go crazy trying to study in here. And it's cold in here, no matter how much I turn up the heat. Nothing helps the cold. And it's always dark.  
  
In my notes there's a flier for a Halloween party. The med school. Fine. That'll do. _I don't care, I really don't care who or where you are, Scott Summers. I'm going to a party. And I will meet people who are here and I will have fun._  
  
I can catch the next train to the bar.  
  
****  
  
I step out of the bathroom wearing Jean's robe. I had dropped the white dress on the floor, near the door. It's gone. Excellent. I find Jean in the kitchen. She's wearing sweatpants. Barefoot. A knit sweater, the collar a little tattered. A man's sweater. I've seen no evidence of men in her life in the last nine days. There's an empty wine bottle near the sink. A second bottle is near the microwave.  
  
Jean glances at me. I make sure bruises show on my arms. My throat. Fingerprints visible across the room. "I don't know . . ." she says. "Are you hungry? The phone," she adds quickly, "is right there. On the wall."  
  
I walk to it. There is a short list of numbers taped next to the base. "Scott" is as the top. "Misty" has three cross-outs with new numbers. "Hank." "Ororo." "Professor," lined out, then "Charles." The same number. "Erik" is next. His number has been crossed out, a new number penciled in. After Erik's number is a note, "Emergencies." I take the phone. I hesitate. When she doesn't turn towards me, I fumble the phone. When she looks at me I am sure to be near tears.  
  
"Do you have someone to call?" Jean asks me. I slowly shake my head, no. "Well," she says decisively. "Are you hungry? I'm hungry. Let's, ah, you're not a vegetarian, are you?"  
  
I smile and wipe tears from my eyes. "No," I say. "Really, you don't have to go to any trouble. You've already done enough. I'll get dressed and be going."  
  
"No, you won't," Jean says. "Your dress was filthy. I threw it in the wash."  
  
I do not smile. But Jean looks up at me, sharply. _Difficult to read does not mean impossible,_ I remind myself. _Sloppy._  
  
"Something funny?" she asks me.  
  
"I would have told you to throw it out," I say. "It wasn't mine."  
  
Jean looks at me. I feel her mind again. She turns to the stove and begins cooking. Burgers, it looks like. Jean's back is to me when she asks. "What are you doing here, really?"  
  
****  
  
_This is not very good beer._ Medical students, I'd noticed, did not have a lot of disposable cash. Lots of capital, none of it liquid. _Or at least not potable liquid._ I stop giggling as soon as I notice I'm doing it. _Hasn't stopped you from drinking._  
  
Everyone is talking to everyone else. Everyone but me. Well. They're mostly from the School of Medicine, not the Sackler Institute. Not the same crowd at all. _But the invitation had been for everyone . . ._  
  
"I really ought to leave." No one hears me. I put down my beer and tryi to figure out how to get to the door. I'm squirming along the edge of the dance floor when I nearly run down the slight young man going the other way. As we brush I catch, something? Some edge in his mind, something half-familiar, almost. He feels like . . . like a mutant. Another mutant? _What the he-_  
  
"What the hell?" I yank the man's jacket sleeve.  
  
"Hey!" He turns. African-American, or something along those lines. Young. Too young to be in the bar, maybe. His hostile look changes to open appreciation. Though the appreciation stops before it gets above my neck. Sort of levels out across my breasts. "I was gonna say hands off, but, a sweet sho'ty like you? We could be a little more hands _on,_ 'f'no'w'i'm sayin'."  
  
"Don't be ridiculous," I switch to telepathy. *I know you're not what you say you are, so please stop talking in that slang.*  
  
The man jumps. Honest concern shows in his mind for a moment. But I can't, i can't quite hear it as much as usual. His mind is a muddle. Difficult to read. But he has the distinct feel of other-than-baseline-human. Erik would say homo superior. Mutant. Evolved.  
  
"That's some trick," the man says. "I didn't see your lips move."  
  
*That's because they didn't.*  
  
The man blinks and smiles. "M'name's Anton," he says, moving closer. "And I didn't catch yours."  
  
"Because I didn't tell you," I say, looking around. The room is crowded. "We're going to talk," I tell him. "But not here."  
  
_Doesn't this just figure. I go to a party I don't want to be at, to drink beer I don't like, with people I don't know, and I find a previously unknown mutant. Well._ I should be more specific than that. _Unknown to the professor. The professor would want me to recruit this kid. Bring him into the orbit of the school. For his own good, honestly. He looks like some sort of criminal. Great._  
  
****  
  
In the cab I'm Anton. He's familiar enough in the South Bronx. Or, his type. The cab passes the One-Dollar Shops, their store fronts gaudy with neon behind the locked gates. It's a weeknight. Regardless of what the news says, this is a working neighborhood. Decent people are in their homes at 11:00 at night. It starts raining and I smile. That will be perfect.  
  
Anton's not a decent sort. The cabbie knows this, glancing at Anton's gold tooth and carefully tied bandanna. But the cab driver won't remember him, one thug up to no good in a sea of thugs.  
  
We stop in front of Grey's building. In much better times it was a series of spacious apartments, two to a floor, four stories high. Now it's cut up into dingy two-room apartments, efficiencies, and narrow attics masquerading as lofts. The sort of subdividing that exists wherever building inspectors are paid less than general contractors.  
  
After the cab pulls away I step into a shadowed corner and set the duffle bag down. I pull out the white dress. I need a real piece of cloth for this. Something I can take off, something that will be dirty and vulnerable and wet, something she can throw in the laundry. Something feminine that inspires concern and pity. I pull the dress on over Anton and as I do I shift into Sarah. The girl that Grey thinks is really me.  
  
I stand in the rain to make sure I'm freezing and the duffel bag is soaked through.  
  
Her apartment really ought to have better security. I don't even have to break in. I wait until a young man and his friends are staring at my breasts through the wet dress. They hold the door. I fall against the smallest one, a thank you. They'll remember my body, how Felix copped a feel. Not whether I have a key.  
  
She lives on the third floor. I walk up, examining the surroundings. No needles or garbage in the stairs. No broken doors with eviction notices. This is a nice building for the neighborhood. I wonder how she can afford it. Even in the South Bronx, this is more money than a medical student has. Maybe she has more money than I think. That would be even better.  
  
I knock on her door. Knocking is more urgent than a doorbell or buzzer. Knocking raises the pulse, makes people think of fires and heart attacks and calling the police. Jean peers through the peephole. I feel her, that strange sliding along the edge of my mind. She can't tell what I'm thinking, not easily. She told me as much.  
  
"Sarah? What are you-- Are you okay?"  
  
I am crying. Rather, I make sure that I am _not_ crying, which I suspect will be more effective. Struggling to hold it together, that will be my first tactic.  
  
"Jean," I say. "I'm sorry, I couldn't think of -- I." I paused and sniffle, hard. A slight bit of realistic ugliness makes people accept the illusion. A small pimple. A running nose. "I know this is terrible, and I'm sorry. But could I use your phone?"  
  
"How did you know where I live?"  
  
"I looked you up in the phone book. J. Grey, there's a few of them, but not in your neighborhood." A misdirection. I looked her up, yes, but only to make sure my story was correct. I already knew where she lived. I'd been following her for nine days, since the Halloween party at the Hot Parrot. Jean gets off the Seventh Avenue Line, frowning, every day. She had mentioned, at the Halloween party, how the crowded city affected her. I imagine the subway must be hard. She walks towards home and stops, every day, at the small market in her neighborhood. She laughs and talks to the owner. And every day she pauses, a hitch in her walk, outside the adjacent liquor store. Today she went in.  
  
I hear the locks rattling. "Come in," Jean says.  
  
****  
  
I pull Anton along, out into the street. He's smiling, a false expression that makes me raise my telekinesis slightly. A little barrier between me and that dead-eyed smile.  
  
"We got business?" Anton asks. "Exams wearing you down, you need a little extra something to help you get through? I got ephedrines, sure, and more."  
  
"I am not interested in your, what, your drugs? You sell drugs?" Of course he sells drugs. I extendmy telepathy to its limit, trying to pick up anything from Anton's mind. "You're like me. I know this. You have talents. Abilities? That others don't have. Right?"  
  
He stops smiling. It's not an improvement. "What does it matter to you?"  
  
"In case you hadn't noticed, I'm -- I'm a mutant," I say quietly. "I have abilities." I speak directly into his mind this time, telepathic projection of my voice in his head. *You know I can talk in your mind, right? I can read minds too, usually.*  
  
"Usually?"  
  
"Yours is a lot harder, for some reason. Maybe it's connected to your ability?" I look the young man up and down. "What is your power, exactly?"  
  
Anton shrugs. "I don't always look like this."  
  
"That's not saying a lot."  
  
"Nope."  
  
"What do you look like?"  
  
"A lot of different people."  
  
"Show me."  
  
"No."  
  
"What?"  
  
"You deaf? I don't have to show you anything."  
  
I stare at him. _Why does this have to be difficult?_ "Do you like your life? I mean, I'm not judging here. Well, okay, yes, I am judging. What the hell are you doing? Running drugs on the street? Don't you want a better life?"  
  
"Woman, you met me two minutes ago. I have a life. If you don't like it, what? You gonna give me a new one?"  
  
"Why not?"  
  
"Who the fuck are you, making offers?"  
  
"I . . ." He's got a point. I'm not anybody. A med student with an absentee boyfriend and a stomach-full of cheap beer. "I know some people."  
  
"Well, your people can call my people, right? They'll do lunch."  
  
Anton turns to walk away and I can't let him. Not with all of Professor Xavier's lectures about mutants, about safety in community, about building a future rattling around. I know what Scott would want me to do. He would have _confidence_ in me. _Well, Scott, --_ I think, and I shove into Anton's head, hard, looking for a way to convince him. I stop, blinking. "You're not a guy."  
"The fuck you talking about?"  
  
I put my hand on Anton's -- that couldn't be the right name -- on his? Her? Arm. "Show me."  
  
****  
  
I pull the robe closer around me. "Well, you met Anton, at the party?" I wait for Jean to nod. She's opening the wine. Good. "He's a dealer for Daddy Zebra. A, uh, a criminal, I guess." I hesitate with false embarrassment, and take the wine with a gratitude that is obvious. "Anton worked for him. And some other things."  
  
"You sold drugs." Jean says, drinking her wine.  
  
" _Anton_ sold drugs, and he slept with Daddy Zebra. Daddy," I explain, "doesn't mind if they are boys or girls as long as they are young and they can take a slap."  
  
Jean grimaces. "That's awful!" she exclaims. "That's, that's really awful!" She gets out two plates and a few things from the refrigerator. I can see that she keeps her kitchen neat. There is food in the fridge. It is orderly. Not many dishes in the cupboard. Only four cups, total. Not enough for company. "Did you call the police?" she asks.  
  
"Anton would never call the police," I explain. "It's not how his world works."  
  
"But you're not Anton," Jean says. She glances over her shoulder at me, hair falling in her face. She has a very pleasant voice. Low.  
  
"No," I agree. "But I can't call the police except as Anton. If I'm not Anton, aren't we missing a victim?"  
  
"Hmm," Jean replies. She makes up two burgers and sits across the counter from me. "If you don't intend to call the police, why are you here?"  
  
"I-" I hesitate, I put the burger down and take a large gulp of wine. The alcohol doesn't affect me unless I want it too. I might as well be drinking water. "Something happened tonight. Anton did something, and I can't stay. I needed a place to think. Anton doesn't have any friends. No acquaintances, either, outside of Daddy Zebra's circle. I had met you and we -- well, we have something in common. A secret." I look at her, my eyes wide again. "Since the party, I guess. I guess it made me a little reckless, knowing that there was someone else like me. With abilities to hide. I got cocky with Daddy Zebra." I make sure to look blank now, shocked. "I don't know . . . exactly? How it happened."  
  
Of course, I'd ripped his throat out with my bare hands. My real hands, not Anton's soft, weak, manicured hands.  
  
Jean looks up quickly. _Dammit,_ I think. _Careful. You don't know what she might hear._  
  
"You're angry," she says. "What did he do this time?"  
  
I shrug and look small. ""Nothing he hadn't done before. I told you, I just . . . I'd never thought I had options before. I just got cocky. And he got angry."  
  
Jean looks down at the counter. "There's a place. A school, really. For people like us." She glances at me. Her eyes stutter across the open neck of my robe. Interesting. "For mutants, I mean."  
  
_What else would you mean?_ I think. I do not smile.  
  
"I'm not sure I like that word," I say. "Mutant. It sounds . . . "  
  
"I know," Jean says quickly, waving her glass a bit. "It is a bit shocking, but Erik always says it does us no good to try and hide the truth with pretty euphemisms."  
  
"Erik?" Maybe this is the missing boyfriend.  
  
"Erik, ahhh," Jean looks nervous suddenly. Why nervous? "Erik Lehnsherr. He's a political theorist, a professor of mine. Or, I mean, he was my professor." That sounds interesting. Was? _And why isn't he now, Jean? A little close, were you?_  
  
"Was?"  
  
"He and the professor had a difference of opinion about the school. Its future. Erik. He - " Jean drinks suddenly, a large swallow. Her eyes are tearing up. Fascinating. I can use this. "He left a while ago, but he always kept in touch. Now he's decided that it's too dangerous. And that I shouldn't talk to him any more."  
  
"I see." Hmm. "And you and this Erik, you were . . . lovers? I take it? And that's why he left?"  
  
Jean chokes, spitting wine. "Not like _that,_ " she said quickly, wiping up the spilled wine with her sleeve. "He was my _guardian,_ " Jean says, "I was thirteen when I met him!" I shrug. She looks at me quickly. "But that . . . that doesn't mean much to you, does it? How a parent relates to a child? I can almost see it, right there . . . " I glare at her and she leans back, blushing slightly. "I'm sorry," she says. "I shouldn't pry. That was very rude."  
  
"Well," I say, holding out my glass for more wine, "if that's not why he left, then, why? And why is it dangerous to call him?"  
  
"He, ah," Jean shrugs. "He decided that the course of mutant rights activism needs to be more active. And Charles, the professor, that is, he thinks we need to keep working within the established systems."  
  
I think about that. "He's the one on the news," I say. "Lehnsherr. He's the one who calls himself 'Magneto,' isn't he?"  
  
Jean nods.  
  
"Does the F.B.I. know you have his phone number tacked to your wall?"  
  
****  
  
"I don't have to show you shit," Anton says.  
  
"You don't have to be treated like shit, either," I counter. "There's a school, a place where mutants can be safe and can learn, together, how to use our powers. You'll learn to do things you didn't know you could."  
  
Anton shrugs my hand off his - no, her - her arm. "I know enough."  
  
"I learned more than I could explain, and you will too. Now I can live in New York, with all their minds all the time, and I couldn't have when I was younger." God, this stupid kid. And I'm angry at the professor for making me try to recruit this idiot, even though he's not here and this is totally my fault. Angry at Ororo for being so dedicated to teaching, even idiots. At Erik for leaving and just leaving and for not staying. At Scott for being so _confident_ in me, for thinking I'll _do the right thing,_ for thinking I'll _help_ somehow. _All of you should just shut up,_ I tell them Not really. Just me, drunk on a cold sidewalk with an idiot. _I have an **idiot** to recruit. A criminal idiot._  
  
"Ain't my fault you're slow."  
  
"I bet you can't really control it." I walk towards Anton, backing the woman against the wall bordering the sidewalk. It helps that I'm taller. Helps that I'm drunk and don't care. Helps that I want the voices in my head to shut up. My friends. Who think the best of me. "I bet you can barely do anything, that's why you don't show me."  
  
"That's a transparent attempt at reverse psychology," Anton says. _Wait. What?_ I blink. Anton's voice has shifted. The diction is clearer. The vocabulary choices are now educated. And the tone . . . "But make it worth my while. Pay me the amount Anton ought to have been earning in there."  
  
I move quickly, putting my hands against the wall on either side of Anton's head. "I'm not paying you. I just think you're trying to weasel out another way." That's not how Hank would handle this. But Hank isn't here, none of them are. Just me on a cold sidewalk on some anonymous block in New York City. A city where I have to keep my guard up _every single minute_ because it is so loud, so very very loud, all the people shouting all the time.  
  
Anton puts her hands on my waist and I jump. I don't like that, and push the smaller woman's arms with my telekinesis, pinning her against the wall. Anton struggles suddenly, eyes wide. " _Bitch_."  
  
"I could call the police, and they could arrest you for dealing, and while you are in custody I could call the professor, and he could convince the police he was taking you to a different precinct, and we could take you to the mansion and keep you there until you cooperate." I wouldn't do that. Neither would the professor. We would never force another mutant to stay at the school, or manipulate how someone else used their powers. That would be . . . abusive, really. But Anton doesn't know that. Scott would be shocked that I even mentioned it, threatened it. _But if Scott cares so much what I do, maybe he should be here so I don't get drunk at parties and assault teenage drug dealers in the street._  
  
Anton lifts her legs and wraps them around my waist. I jump back, or try to, but god she is so much stronger than she looks. "Don't make me hurt you," she warns.  
  
Fine. I won't humiliate myself. I won't struggle. I lean in close. "We can help you, if you'll let us."  
  
****  
  
Jean's eyes flick towards the phone. To the list on the wall, to her own handwriting and the phone number that could put her in prison. "Of course they don't," she says. She's decided to trust me. A little.  
  
"Of course they don't," I agree. I stand, and walk around the small kitchen island towards her. "And they won't find out from me."  
  
The relief is obvious on her face. She smiles, and is quite pretty when she does. She doesn't smile often that I've noticed. "Thank you, Sarah," she says.  
  
"It's Anne, actually." Maybe. It could be Anne. I wouldn't know. "Anne Richart," I say. My second pair of foster parents were decent enough people. Why not use their name? Jean flinches. Her wine glass drops and breaks and the wine splashes across my robe. I jump. I have no idea what is causing this. She looks, she actually looks sick. I grab her and hold her, and she leans over the counter, putting her forehead against the cheap countertop . She breathes for a few seconds, and I am holding about half her weight. _Christ, this woman is tall. And not dainty._  
  
"Sorry," she mumbles, "sorry, sorry, sorry."  
  
"Shh," I say. I try rubbing at her back a little. Is she epileptic? Or does she have, maybe, really low blood pressure?  
  
Jean straightens a little, leaning on the counter now instead of on me. "I knew someone, a long time ago. Her name was Annie Richards, and, ah, she died."  
  
"I'm so sorry," I say. Damn. Stupid coincidence. Thanks, Mr. and Mrs. Richart. Terrible time for me to get nostalgic, thanks for nothing. But maybe I can use this. Yes, I can use this. This is an opportunity, now, while she's vulnerable. Time to build trust. "Were you, close?"  
  
Jean laughs. I struggle to not move away from that laugh. I've heard people kill while making sounds just like that. "You could say I was close, oh yes." Jean turn and faces me. She leans against the counter. Her eyes are drawn to the wine stained across my white robe -- her white robe, of course -- and she bares her teeth. A smile. "I was in her mind when she bled out on the street, paralyzed but still feeling her ribs slide back and forth through her lungs, and she got colder and colder and the only thing she wanted was for her mother to kiss her forehead. You could say we were close." Jean buries her face in her hands. "Oh my god," she says, her voice cracking, finally, and when she starts sniffing and crying I relax. "Why did I tell you that? I never even told that part to Scott . . . "  
  
I move close and hug her. I hold her while she cries, and she doesn't put her arms around me but she doesn't push me away. I need her confidence. She's got the power, and the anger, and she thinks she's a good person. Thinks she's a nice girl. I love nice girls. Naive. They don't know a thing about me.  
  
"I'm sorry," she says, pulling away slightly and wiping at her eyes. "That was not anything you needed to see. Your life, it's got, I mean. Annie died a long time ago," she says.  
  
I stay where I am and move my arms up her back. Holding her. "Don't worry," I say. It was dumb luck, running into her at the party. Just dumb luck. But her power, it's all I've been thinking about. Her telepathy and telekinesis, what I could do with that. The money we could make, it's intoxicating. Now. This is my chance, and I have to take it now. She's curled a bit, and I am standing over her legs. I lean in and kiss her lightly on the lips.  
  
"Anne . . ." Jean says, her eyes wide. "I don-"  
  
I kiss her again, harder, and her mouth opens slightly. Her lips aren't as soft as they look. Cracked, a little. She hasn't been keeping up appearances. Hasn't been acting like a woman with a lover. Our third kiss trembles between us, until she gasps and pulls back. Her hands touch my waist, now, and I do not smile.  
  
"Anne," she says again. "Stop. Please."  
  
I lean back, looking serious. Sombre, even. "I think," I say, "we have a lot in common. Both wishing that, that things were different for us? Right now?" I trace my hands down her back, and along her sides. "We can make things different," I say. "We can share the secrets, share the being alone. Share what comes next." I lean in and press my lips against her neck, kissing the delicate skin above her pulse. She shivers. "We don't have to be scared and alone. We can do things together. Together we can make waking up, tomorrow, something to look forward to." Jean turns her head and kisses my ear, the side of my face. "Oh, Jean," I say, and I love the little catch I put in my voice. I've worked on that a long time.  
  
"Anne," Jean says a third time. "No." And she pushes me away. That's unexpected. I thought I had this one. She's lonely enough to fall for me.  
  
"What's wrong?"  
  
"I, it's that," Jean says. She gently pushes me a little further back "I have commitments. I have, I have a boyfriend. He might be, he's not perfect, but I love him. And I won't do this." Jean rakes her hands through her hair. "Whatever this is."  
  
"It's, I . .. " I stammer and fall back slightly against the far counter. Wounded. "I'm so sorry," I say, flushing. "I thought, after the way we almost kissed at the party, I thought there was, oh god!" I break off, the picture of embarrassment. "I thought there was a, a connection." I clutch Jean's stained robe tight around me and glance at the other room. "If you'll give me my clothes back, I'll be going. Now."  
  
"Oh, no, it's not li-"  
  
"This was a mistake."  
  
"No, stop it, where are -"  
  
" -- I'll just lea- "  
  
"--be an idiot, you aren't dressed!"  
  
She grabs my arm and holds me in place. Telekinesis. God, she's powerful. We could do so much. If she'll just come around.  
  
"I want to help you," Jean says. "I've just, I've made commitments. To Scott. To the professor." Not, I notice to her old mentor Erik.  
  
"And these commitments, they preclude kissing?" I ask.  
  
"Yes, Scott, remember?" She nods vaguely at the picture I'd noticed, the pretty-boy with the lips, the grin that makes some think of holding hands and others think of face-fucking.  
  
"Your boyfriend." I nod. "Your commitments don't prevent you from kissing him," I say, and I do it. Shift in front of her. The shirt, the jacket, the odd little glasses like goggles. The curls of windblown hair. Jean's eyes widen in shock. One step, two, three steps, I cross the room fast and knock her back against the counter. I grab her thighs, the curve of her ass through the sweatpants and lift her onto the counter in the kitchen. She grabs my hair, hard, and pulls my head back. I lunge for her lip, catching it between my teeth while she kisses me.  
  
"Scott," she says, and her voice is not kind. What has he done, to make her kiss him so hard?  
  
On the counter she is even taller than me, than this Scott who I don't know how tall he is. Probably not taller than her. On the counter she won't notice any errors. I take advantage and slide my hands under her sweater, half grabbing and half teasing across ribs and up to her breasts. She whimpers, shockingly loud, her mouth still on mine and I break the kiss. Her mouth stays open, wide and needy and she tries to kiss me again. Kiss _him_. I move away grinning and raise her shirt. She has lovely breasts. I try to remember them in case I can use them at some point. I duck her open mouth and scrape my teeth lightly across the pale skin of her chest, the edge of her breast but nothing more. I kiss down her stomach and her hands are pulling hard at my hair and I kneel in front of her.  
  
It's funny, but the glasses don't get in my way.  
  
****  
  
"I don't -- " Anton's features shift, blurring to a shade just shy of midnight. It's so fast I'm not sure I really ever see it. Golden eyes, that's all I remember. She shifts into a young woman, white, with curly blond hair. "I don't need your help." Her legs are wrapped tight around my waist her arms still pinned against the filthy wall hair getting dirty. Stupid me. I hadn't noticed the dirt when her hair was dark.  
  
"Maybe you don't," I breathe. I am so close I can see the fine white hairs just along her neck, under her ear.  
  
"I don't," the woman says. She is breathing against my ear. Fast and light and I feel her chest, her breasts, pressing against mine as she pants. "You're hurting my arms," she whispers.  
  
"I am?" She's not struggling and I notice I am not moving away. My hips are pushed hard against hers. "What's your name?"  
  
She tilts her head back. I'm that much taller. Her lips open for a moment before she answers. "Sarah."  
  
"Sarah." I swallow hard. "Would you like to attend a very nice school? It's upstate."  
  
"I can think of things I'd like to do," Sarah breathes. I feel the warmth of Sarah's body against me, through our clothes.  
  
_Why aren't we wearing coats?_ I wonder. Why am I thinking about coats? Sarah puts her arms around my neck. _When did I let go of her arms?_ "Oh?" I ask. Sarah smells like the party, still, like the cigarettes medical students still smoke, the immortality-chasing jackasses that they all are, like the hot sweat of drunk dancers, like warm living people who are _here,_ who are not a half a state away, but are in front of me and don't want a damn thing from Jean Grey.  
  
"Yes," Sarah says Her lips are so close to mine I can nearly taste them. She moves then, closing the space and her lips are soft and warm. I don't move, I can't think what to do. Why am I not moving away? Why aren't I kissing her back? _Scott._ She tastes faintly of mint and her lips part slightly and I m leaning on her now, half-falling into her, my legs weak. My eyes close. She kicks, then, hard, kicks me away and I am sprawling on the wet pavement. By the time I scramble to my feet Sarah is gone, she's run back into the party. I look for her mind but there's nothing, nothing through the emotions and clamor of the drunk revelers. I stop at the doorway. I don't bother looking for Sarah's face.  
  
****  
  
Her pants are still up and I don't want to break this moment by undressing her. Seduction has a rhythm, a time, and if I stop to make her think even for a second, this will fall apart. I open my mouth and spread her legs and press my face against the crotch of her sweatpants and exhale, hard. Hot air across her and I can smell her now, sex and desire. She lets go of my hair and falls back, the slap loud as she catches herself on her palms on the counter. There goes the other wineglass. I hear it break on the cheap tile floor.  
  
I press my mouth and nose against her now, wet tongue against the cotton jersey fabric. Rougher than I think she might be used to, but through the cloth it works. She's panting and making noises that aren't words. Noises that aren't "stop," or "Scott," or "don't."  
  
_She's so powerful. If I win her trust, if this works . . . After this I'll show her the money. All the money in the bag. And she won't ask too closely where it came from or who died for it. And we'll go find this Erik. And this will be the end of it, of drug deals and prostitution and bloody little muggings in shithole apartments. This woman with her power and her loneliness and her complete obliviousness.  
  
A little sex and they fall so fucking easy._  
  
She kicks me away, and I fall on the floor. "What?" she says.  
  
_Difficult to read is not impossible,_ I tell myself viciously. "What?" I say back, wounded innocence on my face. His face. His stubbly glasses-wearing boy-mouth face.  
  
"Using me," she says slowly, her eyes narrowing. "So what _is_ in the bag, Anne?" She looks at the duffel by the door for the first time since I walked in. "Sarah? Anton? Tell me about the bag." Jean slides off the counter and stand over me. "And why is the bag, in your mind, why is it bloody?"  
  
I shift back, to Anne, and try to look scared. It's actually not that hard. Power was why I wanted her in the first place. Power that she has. "It's, it's got five million dollars," I whisper. "Daddy's Zebra's money. I took it when I le-"  
  
"When you killed him," she finishes.  
  
"He was hurting me!"  
  
"Like hell."  
  
"What?  
  
"He might have been hurting you, but that's not why you killed him."  
  
"I didn't mean anything!"  
  
"You saw the money."  
  
"No, it's not like that!"  
  
"And you saw your chance."  
  
"No!"  
  
"You're just a, a criminal," Jean says. "A little street criminal. A thief."  
  
I stand, letting Jean's robe drop. "And you are better?" I shift back to Scott. "Do you prefer adulteress or whore?" I ask sweetly.  
  
"You don't get to wear that shirt," Jean says, clenching her teeth.  
  
I finger the collar. "This means something to you? Maybe you should have remembered that _before_ I had my tongue between your legs."  
  
She slaps me. She's not a fighter and I turn my head when I see her arm swing. It doesn't hurt much. I give this form, this Scott of hers a fat lip, and smile to see her glance at it.  
  
"That's fine," I tell her. "I thought it might be you. Thought you might be smart enough, strong enough, to see what an opportunity I can give you. Get you out of this fine, _fine_ lifestyle you have, in your crap apartment and your shitty classes and your cheap fucking wine to keep you company at night. Fuck you. I have what I need now. I don't need you and your prissy school. Your cocksucker boyfriend and your stupid professor. I have the money and I have the _number_."  
  
Jean blinks at me, confused. I grin. I recite the number back, the penciled-in phone number for "Emergencies only," the contact information for the mutant terrorist.  
  
"You can't call that number," she says.  
  
"Oh yes. I can. And I will. The moment I leave this building."  
  
"No, you can't."  
  
"I'm going to walk out of your building a person you've never seen. With _my_ money, and let me tell you, you never met a man who more deserved having his throat torn out than Daddy Zebra, so I have my money. Don't you think your Erik could use five million dollars? Think I can buy a place with him?"  
  
Jean is pale, shocked.  
  
"I think I can," I say. "And I will." I shift into my own skin. Finally. My own flesh, the colors of jewels and night and candy. "Thank you," I say. I clothe myself in a new form, nondescript and forgettable. I walk to the door and get my bag. "You've been incredibly helpful."  
  
I pull her door shut behind me. She won't follow, or tell anyone. What in the world would she be able to say?


End file.
